Curiosities, Quirky Tidbits, Useful Notes

A remarkable French abbey… The waterfalls of Costa Rica… The origins of tapas… Portugal’s digital nomad visa… A magical art exhibition in Japan… and more.

Picnic Atop a Centuries-Old French Abbey

Nestled in the Provençal scrubland of southeastern France lies the Troglodytic Abbey of Saint-Roman (about a 30-minute drive from Avignon). An architectural wonder, the imposing limestone structure is the only one of its kind in Western Europe. A site of pilgrimage and worship, it contains a series of vaults, tombs, and cave-like cells previously used as monastery dwellings by the Benedictine order.

The caves, along with a 300-foot-long chapel containing the remains of Saint Roman, were carved into the limestone by hermits, and later by the monks themselves, over a period of almost 1,000 years.

While the lower half of the site feels ripe for an Indiana Jones adventure—complete with LED candles casting an ephemeral glow along the hollowed-out rock—the upper level is the real showstopper. The abbey’s monolithic limestone terrace, which holds the vestiges of medieval fortifications that were dismantled in 1850, can be accessed by a single spiral staircase protruding through the rockface. An astonishing panorama awaits.

Surrounded by a blanket of Aleppo pines, holm oaks, and bristling Mediterranean shrubbery, visitors can trace the bends of the voluminous Rhone River as it crosses paths with some of the most spectacular scenery in all southern France. Medieval castles, like nearby Tarascon, hold court with smatterings of blonde-stone Provençal villages, romantic mountain ranges like Les Alpilles (the little Alps), and towering peaks like Mount Ventoux—a stop on the Tour de France.

To make this experience even more memorable, travelers can book an evening aperitif atop the abbey via the tourist office in the town of Beaucaire. You’ll need to call into the office in person to book.

Guests get an “apéro box” full of Provençal specialties like goat cheese wedges wrapped in filo dough, herbed mini-meatballs, and paper cones filled with French charcuterie. Local winemakers set up shop along the chalky plateau with a selection of vintages from the nearby Costières de Nimes appellation. Sunset views of the Rhone River Valley pair quite nicely with the crisp rosés.—Tuula Rampont

“With the Cover”—The Origins of Tapas

If you’ve ever visited Spain, you’ll have experienced the culinary delight that is tapas—little nibbles, usually cured meats, cheese, or bread served with your early evening tipple. Every town, city, and region around the sunny Iberian Peninsula claims to have invented this cultural icon.

Lots of colorful stories claim to explain the origin of this delicious snack. One theory is that in the 13th century, King Alfonso X was struggling with an ailment, for which he was prescribed an immense amount of wine. To avoid slipping into a state of utter intoxication, he ate small portions of food with his drinks. Finding the method successful, he decreed every home and tavern should serve a small amount of food with alcoholic beverages, in a bid to curb public drunkenness.

Another theory is that workers, held hostage to the waning daylight to complete their tasks, would eat only quick, small, and cheap meals in order to return to their labors as quickly as possible.

“Tapas” (or tapar, the verb), in the most literal translation from Spanish to English, means “cover.” This leads to my personal favorite tapas origin myth.

King Alfonso XIII was traveling to the town of Cádiz and stopped for a quick cup of wine in a local tavern near the beach. It was a particularly windy day on the coast, so his server reportedly placed a small slice of cured meat over the glass, to protect it from the sand being blown around them. After eating the ham, and downing his vino, King Alfonso orders another glass…”with the cover.”—John Wallace

Portugal’s New Digital Nomad Visa

One of the many reasons Portugal topped the IL Annual Global Retirement Index for 2023 was the choice of options for getting a long-term visa. Popular visas for North Americans right now include the Golden Visa (read more about the recent changes to this visa in my article on page 8) and the D7. But, there’s a new kid on the block…

Portugal recently unveiled its new digital nomad visa, joining a whole host of countries from around the world who are enticing remote workers to their shores. Under this program, workers who have the ability to live and work from anywhere—those working for foreign companies, or freelancers—can apply for a digital nomad visa that gives them residency in Portugal for either a one-year or five-year span. And it’s renewable.

The requirements are fairly easy to meet: Proof of earning at least €2,836 per month ($2,900) for the last three months, and proof of employment with a non-Portuguese company, or proof of work as a freelancer. That’s pretty much all.

You’re not limited in where you can live in Portugal, and after five years in-country you can apply for citizenship and a Portuguese passport. You can start the process by contacting the consular section of the Portuguese Embassy in your home country.—Jeff D. Opdyke

Berlin’s Secret Underground City

Hovering above my head, the atomic bomb lingers precariously. Ten feet long, thicker than an oil barrel, dark and green, and glinting menacingly in the light’s glare. Fortunately, this is just a scale replica of “Little Boy,” the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima. It’s difficult to focus with it hanging overhead, as our tour guide explains just how much of Berlin would have been annihilated had a similar bomb been dropped on the city.

I’m 35 feet beneath the bustling, historic streets of the German capital, in the belly of the Berlin’s “Unterwelten” (Underground). It consists of both the subway system, the U-Bahn, and an intricate network of bomb shelters created by West Germany during the Cold War.

Underground, the bunker is gray, dark, sterile, and cold. Enormous reinforced concrete gates and rough, thin canopy beds, stacked in fours almost to the ceiling add to the feeling of claustrophobia. I try to crank the old electricity generator and after only 60 seconds, my arms are aching. Should the bombs have started to fall, this generator would have been responsible for providing emergency power to the roughly 3,300 people who would have sought refuge within these bunkers.

Incredibly, the bunkers are linked directly with the U-Bahn. So, during the tour, as you move from one bunker to the next, you’ll sometimes pop out of a door and find yourself smack bang in the middle of a crowded subway station, met with raised eyebrows and puzzled commuters.

The tour costs €15, and your guide will offer real-life stories of wartime Berlin, the schemes for building this vast network of over 3,000 bunkers, and the various contingency plans should the world have reached that most feared tipping point. To find out more, see the Unterwelten website here.— John Wallace